The Right Hand of Darkness
by Critical Tortoise
Summary: Six months after the Dragonborn has cleansed Skyrim of any major threats to the peace and her allies have all moved on, she is called back to action by a strange, if welcome, message from an old friend. Together they uncover the roots of a vast conspiracy, in which no one can be trusted, not even each other. But is it truly a conspiracy, or has darkness taken hold in their hearts?
1. Distance

_The Right Hand of Darkness  
_A novel  
By Critical Tortoise

**I  
**"_**Distance"  
**__**6 Last Seed, 4E 202**_

Above all, she was tired.

Yes, tired was the word. She was definitely tired – not in need of rest or sleep (though she wouldn't exactly complain about getting more sleep); her eyes did not close or falter, they did not waver from the skylight above her; but tired of all her circumstances. She could see Secunda and Masser, the two great moons, looming directly overhead. Sometimes, when she really ought to have been getting more rest, she would get out of bed and wander around outside without aim or destination, with only the stars to guide her.

Tonight was one of those nights, where the howling of wolves and chirping of crickets outside the walls of her manor would keep her awake. In this half-alert state, she stood out on her balcony, wearing little more than her bedsheet and bare skin. With no one out here on the far side of nowhere to bother her, she was free to do and be as she pleased, and she pleased to be free of her armor in the comfort of her own home, if only for the night.

It was the only way she could distinguish the night from the day aside from, of course, the dark. Who would be so stupid as to not notice the dark that enveloped them at night? Certainly not her, though she knew that everyone thought she was naïve enough that such things would not be a very far stretch. Even the courier that came by every morning to deliver the day's meaningless errand requests and correspondence thought so little of her. She could see it in his eyes both earlier that day and the next, long after she had gone back inside and bundled up in her bed, long after she had awoken to start the cycle anew.

This time, his eyes shifted between her face and the letters and it was so painfully obvious he was taking the time to try and peek at each miserable slip of paper. The morning sun was bright and shone through the paper, and she could see the familiar handwriting of several of the nameless villagers from some nearby nameless town. She never bothered to learn their names, because it seemed as if each one's plight was the same, or some minor variation of:

"_Dragonborn, Dragonborn! My horse has been stolen!"_

"_My children are missing!"_

"_I need you to deliver this to my friend in the most inconvenient place possible!"_

"_Please, help me fend off the skeevers in my cellar!"_

And on and on the list of complaints and requests went, largely the same as the ones that came to her in that instant. Most of the time, she would wander over to her stable and get on her horse and ride towards wherever the letters instructed her. Her journal that she diligently kept was an epic tome detailing the great adventures of the Last Dragonborn, Savior of Skyrim, Hero of the Empire, Slayer of Basement Rats.

What fun she had on these days.

"Is that all?" she muttered. Truth be told, she had received far fewer letters as of late, and while she so despised the nature of the tasks, it was at least something for her to do. No longer did Skyrim need her help, it seemed. The dragons still attacked cities, true, but by now the guards had seen how she fought (and killed) the mighty beasts. They were prepared now. And while there were still occasional vampire attacks or bandit raids in the countryside, for the most part, it seemed everything had slowly died down, and that wasn't even counting the death of her own spirit.

The courier's eyes drifted back up from the letters as he handed them off into the Dragonborn's ebony-gauntleted hands. First his vision dragged its way up her arms, the plates of armor polished as close to perfection as could be, then towards the soft curves of her breastplate, at which point he bit his lip in worry that she might see his staring (and she did, but she made no issue of it), and finally to her face.

Her face was always something that people had looked on with some combination of shock and awe; whether in her native High Rock, or in this strange, frozen land she now called home. She never saw herself as some model of beauty, though as a girl many of her peers had praised what Dibella had created on the day of her birth. Her skin was pale white and gleaming like porcelain, like the milky band of stars in the nighttime sky, and was soft and smooth. Those who had both seen her in battle and gotten the chance to see her closer than that would sometimes make jokes about this softness making her flesh so easily pierced by swords. Across her body, but invisible under the armor, were some countless scars and old wounds now faded with time and the power of restoration magic.

She wondered for a brief second if the courier before her saw this scars as he imagined her undressing, but dismissed the thought as she brushed a lock of scarlet hair out of her face, away from her eyes. The eyes were always what caught people's attention, and so most of the time she chose to hide them behind masks and helmets and visors and hoods. The courier had seen them many times over, but each day, with this day being no exception, he struggled to avoid them and their infinite, piercing blackness. It was both a blessing and a curse, how her eyes were such a solid tar color. At least, unlike with the courier, no one could tell where she was looking – but no lover would ever look into them as she so wished they would.

Her mind snapped back to the present, where the courier stared at her as if she were from another world. "Is... that all?" he echoed.

"Yes. That would be what I said. Is that all."

"Oh. Right," he stammered, flipping through the stack of papers in his arms. "Yes, that's it, Dragonborn."

By now the Dragonborn had lost interest in the whole conversation, if it could even be called that, and as he wished her a nice day, his scripted remark was cut off by a wave of her hand, shooing him off back towards whatever infernal plane of Oblivion from whence he came. Annoyed, he looked back up to his eye level a few inches above the Dragonborn's head, and pivoted away, sauntering off into the distance.

The Dragonborn turned back towards the door, slamming it behind her. Rifling through the stack of letters, she found little of consequence. Most of the letters were, as she had predicted, pleas for the aid of the Dragonborn in rather trivial endeavours. All of them were addressed to either the Dovahkiin or Dragonborn, the only two names she ever seemed to go by. Not once in many months had anyone in all of Tamriel called her by her given name. She often wished for her friends back to call her Brenna again – the same friends that had fought alongside her in her battles against the evils that had once threatened the land.

Sometimes, she got letters from them. No such letters had arrived today. Perhaps, Brenna thought, it was the distance between them all that prevented any interaction. Of course, she knew somewhere in the darkest parts of her mind that this was not the case. Everyone had moved on to bigger and better things, yet how far had she fallen? Perhaps it was time for her to venture forth into the world again. Yes, that was what she would do. She would go forth and _find_ adventure. No longer would the happenings of the world simply fall upon her, no, she would go and make things happen. From this point forward, she was a woman of action.

But before she could do anything else, she sat down in the nearest chair by the fire in her bedroom, and took out her journal, charting out her day of attending to the needs of the citizens. It was a thankless job, no doubt, but her job nonetheless. Perhaps Skyrim's greatest challenge was no longer civil war or world-eating gods, but making sure nothing ever escalated to that point again.

Stepping outside towards her stable, she put the small, leather-bound book into her satchel and rode onward along the dirt road, towards the nearest city. There, she decided, she would find the excitement she was looking for. So resolved, Brenna spurred her steed onwards into the distance.

* * *

Normally, the hours passed by less than they lurched onward like dying oxen. Today, however, time flew at her pace - and that pace was like lightning. Over the course of the afternoon she raced past small town after small town, and she felt as though she could keep going the distance forever. Unfortunately, her mighty stallion did not have such endurance, and Brenna was forced to make a stop in Riverwood - not exactly the nearest major city, but big enough regardless.

She rode in through the old moss-covered wooden gate. By the top she could still see the scorch marks from a dragon attack nearly a year ago that she had been dispatched to deal with. What she loved to keep secret, though, was that the dragon had not left those marks - it had been her bumbling around with her then-newfound Thu'um. Of course, now she was a master of the Way of the Voice (or so people loved to tell her), and with the simple utterance of a string of words the world could be bent to her will as she saw fit.

Sometimes she took such delight in scaring the guards at night by throwing her Voice across streets and alleys. Perhaps a little fun could be had in the daytime as well? Glancing around, she noticed the guards had turned to face her as she entered the village. Unable to resist such a prime opportunity, she whispered towards the wall behind them, _"Zul mey gut,"_ and watched as the two jumped and drew their swords, only to turn back around in confusion.

She chuckled and stepped off her horse, walking it along to the nearest stable, where it happily whinnied and back inside, under the shadow of the roof. Taking a long look across her surroundings and breathing in the mountain air, she noticed Riverwood seemed to have changed little since the last time she had been there, at least physically. The map would still be the same. There were, as she remembered, a few dozen houses in any given direction besides the river, but Brenna had seen far bigger cities. Riverwood was definitely no Daggerfall or Solitude - in fact, it wasn't even like Falkreath, and she swore that Falkreath was one of the smallest hold capitals she had seen throughout Skyrim. The town only had one inn to her knowledge, the Sleeping Giant Inn, right down the main road, greeting all the travelers who never passed by. The inn indeed lived up to both of its names. It looked deserted and it looked like the biggest building she could so far see. She trudged over in the hot afternoon sun, lamenting her decision to wear heavy ebony armor. Wiping her brow with a cool metal hand, she stepped up to the door of the inn and crept inside, not really expecting anyone to greet her.

* * *

It had been far too long since she had been here. So many of her friends had moved on. Even the local inn seemed empty as she wandered inside to pay for a room. She could hear the clink of her coins as they were tossed onto the counter amongst the dead silence. No longer was the inn filled with the sound of Orgnar, the inn's owner, grumbling about his lack of help. There was no sound of Sven's lute - he had long since landed a much nicer position playing in one of Whiterun's many taverns. Nor was there the sound of guests shuffling about. Truly, the inn was a sleeping giant. Riverwood had always been a quiet town, this was something Brenna knew firsthand, but never had she expected it to wither away like this.

Time, it seemed, caused everything to fade, and Brenna cursed Akatosh's name as she pulled the covers over herself that night. It was the first time in months she had ever uttered a Divine's name, and she found herself doubting more and more that the gods even cared if she did; her doubt carrying her off into a dreamless, formless sleep.

The night was black. How black it was could not be counted or described, but she knew it was like death. She had seen such darkness many times before and for the longest time she had thought she would never see it again, but here it was, inescapable. Whether her eyes were open or shut, she could see nothing in the dark room as she awoke in the middle of the night just as before. Sleep was an elusive beast. In the dark, Brenna sat up in the bed, her armor still clinging to her body. She had been much more tired than she thought, if she could pass out like that. Clearly, she was in need of rest, in need of sleep. But what kind of person would she be if she slept at an hour like this? There were people depending on her! People she did not know the names of at all, but people nonetheless. Who were these people? How did their lives intertwine with hers? What needed to be done? Perhaps she should have set off into the night right then and there and headed off towards wherever she was needed._ I don't even know where I'm needed,_ she realized. Chastizing herself, she held out her hand and cast a ball of Magelight into the air, where it hung over the bed. She took her journal out of her satchel and opened it, reading through her notes and tasks:

_6 Last Seed, 4E 202 - Once again the courier has come by. He's been coming by less and less, but I suppose I do live a bit out-of-the-way. After a bit of an awkward exchange between us, he gave me some of the letters that (surprise) were requesting my help. Most of my business appears to be in Whiterun, actually. All for the best, I suppose. I haven't seen anyone there in a while and I'm sure they're all going as crazy as I am with such a lack of… anything at all happening. I should stop by and see what everyone has been up to since I've been gone._

There. Whiterun. A nice, bustling city, where she had many old friends and surely where there were new friends to be made. Maybe it was the countryside doing her in - she had never seen such expanses of wilderness in all her life before now, and it boggled her mind how all this space could contain so few people. She had chosen this solitude, but now it was time for something new again.

Yes, she had had enough of Riverwood, of Falkreath, of every damned forest and mountain to last her a lifetime twice over. It was time to head to the city for a change. She would go forth and get back into the world, and even if it were to be her one last song, she would have no regrets about singing it, and the world would behold her Voice as its protector.


	2. One Last Song

**II  
**"_**One Last Song"  
**__**11 Last Seed, 4E 202**_

Brenna bounced up from her bed, brushing out bits of fabric caught between the plates of her armor. Now, she had a driving force behind her. It didn't particularly matter how, or at this point, why she was going to get to Whiterun, but Whiterun was from this point forward her one and only goal until she arrived there. She stepped out of her room after picking up her satchel and shoving her journal back inside, her metal-covered boots clanking against the inn's stone floor, creeping out into the inn's main hall as quickly and quietly as she could.

Of course, such a thing was relative - no sooner than a minute after she stepped out of her room did a man she had never seen before nor did she honestly care to interact with step out as well, his head cocked and his eyes still partially fused shut with sleep in the corners. He gave her a quick once-over, his eyes widening at the sight of the ebony-armored woman in the darkness. For a moment, he seemed to be about to speak, but when the warrior put a hand on the blade by her side, he shivered, stepping back into his room with a chill coursing through his body.

Satisfied with her latest victory (and so far, her only victory in recent memory), Brenna strode across the floor of the inn's main hall towards the door, no longer bothering to keep quiet. As she threw open the door, her hair blew back from the sudden nighttime breeze sucked into the building. She spit a strand a hair out of her mouth and broke into an eager sprint towards her horse, only to stop and try to regain her composure. Everyone outside must have been watching her prance around like a little girl. How foolish she must have looked to all of them.

Turning around, she expected to affirm her fears, but found no such luck: not a single soul was anywhere to be found. Riverwood was such a boring town that even the guards were not out that night, instead having chosen to remain in their homes, probably watching the skies from their windows just as she did every night when she could not not find the strange, foreign thing that was sleep.

A small chuckle escaped her lips as she mounted her horse, who whined and complained at the sudden awakening.

"Hush now," she whispered, leaning next to the stallion's ear. "Stop whining, we have to go now. You can rest later."

The horse offered no response save a reluctant neigh as his rider pulled back on the reins, twisting his tired and aching body towards the road. Brenna wrestled with the horse for several seconds as he made his best attempt to stay put, but his legs gave way to the force she exerted upon him, and at last he tripped and stumbled forward, breaking into a majestic stride. He felt the cool hand of his rider upon his neck, brushing downwards in approval.

Dust spewed up into the air as the horse's hooves stamped over and over against the dry summer road, each little storm rising up into the faces of various guards and passersby. Onward she rode through the stone portal and away from this obnoxiously quiet town, on the road to Whiterun, through the day and the night, through the howling of the breeze and through the unquiet darkness.

* * *

She lost count of the hours, and was free from the bounds of space and time in her saddle. There were no limits to what she could do - she could ride anywhere, no roads could bind her to any sort of path. She could not be entrapped by the hands of time and fate, and would decide where she went. And how many decisions there were - every dozen paces, there was a new fork in the road, a new cave, a new barrow, all with countless secrets to be found. Yet still she cared only of reaching Whiterun, and there were many roads she had not taken. The White River and stars were her guide.

In truth, it was not as long as she thought - only a few days had passed by the time she rode up to the massive stone walls of the hold capital in the dusk. Looking up, she saw Whiterun in all its glory and magnificence. Unlike Riverwood, the scars of past battles no longer shown along the walls or the skyline. She had not been present for the Battle of Whiterun, months ago - she had been on Solstheim, dealing with Miraak and his cult.

An Imperial soldier stepped over to her side when she stopped at the gates, holding up a torch and squinting. "Dragonborn," the soldier said, the title irritating her in the depths of her mind. "You haven't been to the city in quite some time."

Was he some old friend? She had not served in the Legion - she had found it more prudent to get straight to killing Alduin. Looking across his face, she grew frustrated and hated the faults of her memory. The guard himself, meanwhile, seemed to only be slightly perplex, raising a brow. "Is something wrong?" he asked stupidly.

"No, nothing is wrong. Everything is great," she said without a smile, even though it had been the first time in a while she had said it without sarcasm.

The glow of the guard's torch highlighted beads of nervous sweat running down her forehead, and she brought an arm to her face and brushed her hair out of her eyes and the sweat from her brow. In response, the guard turned away, towards one of his colleagues, and gave him some obscure signal she knew she could never possibly memorize. Somehow decoding such cryptic instructions, the guard pulled down a nearby lever, and the gates to the city opened outward. Her horse crept forward a few steps before the soldier next to her held out a hand. "Hold on, Dragonborn. I think your horse needs some rest. Go on ahead into the city, someone'll take him down to the stables."

For once, it was an order she could concede to. Promptly, she dismounted, her boots clanking against the cobblestone. From her much less lofty perch, she was once again reminded of the Nordic physique, that is to say, everyone was taller than her: she looked up at the guard, who hestitated before saluting her. She knew it was hestitation, what else could it have been? They looked down upon her, both figuratively and literally, and she glared at him, uncaring as to why he seemed to perplexed by her.

Turning towards the open gates, she strode into the city without a word and left her horse behind, but the same could not be said for her troubles. Late at night, she had time to think, without the hordes of townsfolk hustling and bustling and generally annoying her. Why had she come to this place again? It had been business. She had thought to see her friends, but had been so foolish as to arrive so late at night. Another mistake.

She looked around her surroundings, taking in the sights of the city. The Plains District was a charming place. It was a town, not a city. The city did not come until later. The streets slithered on into the shadows, and only the occasional bare torch and the stars above provided light, but it was still infinitely brighter than that manor of hers.

Forward, she marched on, and not once did she realize how tired she was until she happened upon a quaint little house that was not particularly different from all the others, except for the word "Breezehome" carved above the door. Some time ago, she had bought the little house, and she reached for her satchel - her satchel had been her best companion, carrying dozens of potions and Divines only knew how many useless trinkets in its enchanted space. Within, she finally dug out her keyring from one of the various pockets, and flitted through it until she found the key to the house before her, and stepped inside. No one had been in the house in months. She had long since cleared her things from there and moved them all to the manor by the lake in Falkreath. Yet still there remained some of the old trappings - shelves and crates full of items she had never bothered to investigate, and a warm bed that she seeked out and fell into with no purpose but a dreamless, formless sleep.

* * *

This time, however, she failed in her purpose: she saw visions. Of what, she was not sure in the slightest, and they disturbed her in her incognizant state. Noises plagued her ears for a small part of the night, and then deafening silence fell upon her until she awoke, once again in her armor.

Yet wakefulness was no less dark than sleep. Opening her eyes, she saw nothing ahead of her but the blackness, and she nearly screamed, jumping up as a piece of paper fell from her eyes.

Blushing from the humiliation that no one had been around to see, she picked up the paper that had fallen onto her lap, and already she could see the ink through the back in a familiar handwriting - or at least it struck her as familiar, even if it wasn't. There was no persistence in memory, no thought without fault. She couldn't remember one way or another, and she shrugged and unfolded the note:

_Brenna,_

She stopped reading, setting down the note and giving the wall behind her a paranoid glance, and two realizations set into her waking mind:

One, someone had broken into her house.

Two, someone had broken into her house and knew who she was.

So many people knew who she was, but few people knew her name. Those that did inevitably fell into the trappings of titles and formalities, and she could not cure the plague of Dragonborns and Dovahkiins and My Thanes and Ma'ams. But someone here had acknowledged her, and her wish had been fulfilled, at long last.

Brenna took the letter into her hands once more and stood up, heading towards the front door and clearly not looking where she was going.

_Brenna,_

_I know we haven't spoken in a while, but I've something I'd like to discuss._

_I can't speak much more of it right now. I don't know if you'll even receive this message, but if you do, come back to the castle as soon as you can - and you know exactly which castle I mean._

_Serana._

The name at the end hit her like she hit the doorframe on her way outside. Serana. A name she had once held so many feelings about - mixed feelings, to say the least. And now she had found her friend once more with the simple opening of a letter.

A sick feeling came to her stomach for a fleeting second, and she never did figure out what exactly it was - a feeling of dread and nervousness. This was not opening a letter. This was opening her festering old wounds.

* * *

**I'm so sorry this took me nearly a month to get out. I admit, the chapter is short and offers little closure (the ending isn't very good at all), but I was so tired of having this sitting in a folder unfinished that I just had to get it out there. Luckily, unlike every other fanfic I've ever started, I do have a real plan for this one, and no matter what I do, you will see it finished at some point. Future chapters will probably be more varied in length. The next chapter, however, you can expect to be a good bit longer than this one. Thanks to everyone who followed, by the way! It's nice to know that people are willing to put up with me and my incessant delays. The next chapter will not take a whole month - I promise.**


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